Hi.
I have downloaded tons of software to install. Heres my problem:
the software comes in .Tar balls as I understand it, next you are to make a folder to store all the components of the .tar ball (which as
I understand it is just another way of decompressing the downloaded file.

So here's were I'm stuck!!!!
I now have this decompressed .tar file in a folder were do I go from
here???
I need some help real soon cause' I have TONS of downloaded stuff in my home directory.
Oh; I running SUSE Linux 10.2 if this helps!!

Many Thanx!!!!!!!!!

If you are working with source you need to compile, i.e.
./configure
make
make install

Look at http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...e-10.2-537475/

If you look in YaST2 -> Installation Sources, and click Community Resources, you can add additional repositories. The VLC & Packman repos contain the versions of media programs you probably are looking for. Try searching for software by exploring what is available via YaST. Compiling packages from source is fine, but sometimes different versions of libraries are needed, which may cause conflicts now or in the future.

Also, when you compile tarballed packages from source, you will need the *-devel versions of the dependent libraries, and not just the libraries themselves. The regular packages contain the .so dynamically loadable libraries. The *-devel versions also supply the .a static libraries and the header files.

You also may need to install the binutils, gcc, g++, make and the autotools packages before you can build packages. After you build the first few packages, you won't need to install as many dependancies each time you build a new package.

Keep in mind, that if you build a program or library from source, it is your responsibility to track if security patches are needed and to apply the patches to the source and rebuild the program. If a program is available via YaST, then SuSE does this work for you and you just need to update your system.